


This Is The End, Beautiful Friend

by amyfortuna (elwinfortuna)



Series: B2MEM 2020 [1]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angband, Gen, Hope vs. Despair, Thangorodrim
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-05
Updated: 2020-03-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:06:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23025250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elwinfortuna/pseuds/amyfortuna
Summary: Fingon faces facts, and then defies them.
Relationships: Fingon/Maedhros (implied)
Series: B2MEM 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1654819
Comments: 4
Kudos: 28
Collections: Back to Middle-earth Month 2020: Endings and Beginnings





	This Is The End, Beautiful Friend

**Author's Note:**

> B2MeM Prompt: March 4: “He thought he had come to the end of his adventure, and a terrible end, but the thought hardened him.” 
> 
> The title is a reference to The Doors’ song “The End.”

Fingon could not see further than a few feet in front of himself, the mists were so thick. Here in the lower passes of the triple-crowned mountain of Thangorodrim, there were odd pockets of green gas that turned him sick and faint, there were other places where the mist collected in seemingly endless curves of the mountain, leading him on wild goose chases that he had spent too much time tracking his way back out of. 

He was looking for a way in. The gates were too heavily guarded. Escaped thralls, having made their way to Mithrim, told of secret paths out of the stronghold, some of which potentially could be located from the outside, if someone wanted to sneak in. 

But what spell of insanity would a person have to be under to try to sneak into Angband? Fingon shook his head at himself, not for the first time, and sank onto a boulder with a sigh. He was exhausted, he could barely see, and his head was swimming from the foul air he had been breathing. His ears were ringing, too, and his head ached. 

He had very little remaining of the coimas he'd brought with him, taken from the batch that Irissë made shortly after arriving in Mithrim. It was of wheat they had traded with the local Sindar for, and it was decidedly inferior to that of Valinor, or maybe that was just his sister's baking -- by no means her greatest talent. Before much longer he would have to turn back, or make up his mind to starve. There was nothing here he could eat save some ill-looking moss, and no drink except rainwater, and that was not improved by the smokes and mists of Angband. 

Fingon sighed again. He had better face facts. This was the end of his adventure, and unless he went home while he still had strength and food to do so, it would be a terrible end indeed, to die of starvation and poisoned air, or to be captured by the roving Orc patrols he had so far successfully evaded. If he found his beautiful friend again, it would only be in the Halls of Mandos as one of the dead, or as a fellow captive of Angband.

But something within him hardened. Not yet, not yet. He was not ready to give in. Standing up, he picked up his bag, preparing to move on. Fastened to it was his harp, carried with him because he had carried it across the Ice and he was not going to leave it behind now. 

His fingers brushed the strings and he fancied that the mist retreated from the low melodic sound. 

He smiled. Oh, to be able to see again, no matter what horrors might be revealed. Even if it it meant capture. 

He untied the harp, sat back down on the boulder, arranging himself as though he were performing for a crowd, and there in the dim light, lost in the mist, he began to sing a song of Valinor.


End file.
